8 people dead in Ukraine bus fire

The explosion occurred when the driver stopped the bus on a roadside to carry out repairs.

An explosion and resulting fire on a bus parked along a road in western Ukraine on Wednesday killed eight people and injured two, the Emergency Situations Ministry said.

HT Image

Eleven passengers who were heading to Lviv to sell tomatoes were in the bus when it caught fire, said ministry spokesman Vitaliy Turovtsev. Two children were among the dead, he said.

Turovtsev said the explosion occurred when the driver stopped the bus on a roadside to carry out repairs and was pouring fuel from a gasoline tank into a canister.

He said the driver had violated safety rules, since the bus doors were closed during the repairs, and that the passengers were sleeping at the time of the blast.